In those last sad days for her country-people Margot showed of what stuff she was made. Consoling, upholding, encouraging, she seemed to have arrived suddenly at a noble womanhood. This, however, was not the case. She had been growing toward it slowly but surely through years of adversity. The continued delay in the coming of the transports bred trouble betwixt the soldiers and the Acadians. “The soldiers,” we are told, “disliked and despised them,” the Acadians, and the general found it necessary not only to enforce discipline more sternly among his troops, but to administer the lash also on occasion. At last, one October day, Winslow had four transports at his disposal. Orders and counter-orders, lamentation and weeping, disturbed the clear, still air. Villages had to be arranged to go together in the same transport as well as families; and this, with so few troops at his command, was no easy task for the general, who naturally was possessed of very little experience as regarded organization. Gabriel, who while under Washington had received of necessity some training, was his right hand man. The male prisoners were removed from the ships to land while the mustering went forward. As the women filed past the spot where for a moment the harassed general and his subordinate had come together, and the pair gazed upon the melancholy confusion of young and old, and household belongings in carts, Winslow groaned: “I know they deserve all and more than they feel; yet it hurts me to hear their weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth!” At Fort Edward, as well as at many other places in the province, the same terrible scenes were being enacted—those in command, without one single authentic exception, carrying out the stern decree as mercifully as possible. Beside the long train of women walked the priest of each village, encouraging and upholding his flock. A few of these priests accompanied the exiles, but most of them returned to Canada. Not all the women, however, were “weeping and wailing.” Some, as has been remarked, appeared to be wholly undisturbed. Among these latter was Julie, in the cart with whom was Margot, bound to see the last of her benefactress. As they passed, both women waved their hands to the two officers, Julie calling gayly to Gabriel: “It is well, _M. le mari_! Our ship goes to Virginia, where we shall again meet. Is it not so?” For weary weeks the misery was prolonged, and it was the close of the year before Winslow’s and Murray’s bitter task about the Basin of the Mines was completed. But improved organization rendered even difficult things easier, and by the last of October the general was able to part, though with extreme reluctance, with his most efficient subordinate. Gabriel, promoted to a captaincy, set sail with his wife on one of the transports for Virginia.